M's Surge Hits a Speed Bump

Seattle Mariners catcher Kenji Johjima, left, tries to tag Detroit Tigers' Carlos Guillen at the plate in the fifth inning Thursday, July 3, 2008, in Seattle. Guillen scored on a single by Matt Joyce as the Tigers won 8-4.
(Elaine Thompson | Associated Press)

Seattle Mariners manager Jim Riggleman (47) heads to the mound to talk with catcher Jeff Clement, center, and starting pitcher Carlos Silva after he gave up a run to the Detroit Tigers in the fifth inning Thursday. Detroit cruised to an 8-4 win.
(Elaine Thompson | Associated Press)

SEATTLE

If not their golden days, the Seattle Mariners' previous 12 games were a golden opportunity to win, which they did against some weak Mets, Padres and Blue Jays teams.

Despite going 8-4 during that stretch, this weekend offers a better measure of who the Mariners are.

Thursday night, they didn't seem much different than the club that stumbled to the worst record in baseball and got their hitting coach, manager and general manager fired.

The surging Detroit Tigers beat the Mariners 8-4 at Safeco Field, where the M's starting pitching stumbled, as did their hitters in the clutch.

Carlos Silva, who ended a two-month winless streak in his last start, gave up five runs on nine hits in five innings, falling to 4-10.

The Mariners actually led twice against Tigers starter Justin Verlander, 1-0 in the first inning and 2-1 in the third. Their inability to turn those one-run blips into bigger innings cost them.

The Mariners stranded 13, leaving the bases loaded in the first inning and runners at first and third in the third, both times when Richie Sexson grounded out to end the innings.

"We missed some opportunities early and so did they," Mariners manager Jim Riggleman said. "Both pitchers were facing some lineups that were putting the bat on the ball and creating some rallies. If we had finished ours off, it would have been a different ballgame."

The Mariners scored on Jose Lopez's RBI single in the first inning and Jose Vidro's run-scoring infield hit in the third, then twice in the ninth when Vidro hit an RBI groundout and Adrian Beltre a run-scoring single.

Otherwise, the Mariners' offense produced nothing despite finishing with 14 hits. Three of them were by Ichiro Suzuki, including a milestone.

His infield single in the sixth inning was the 1,700th hit in his major league career. It also was his 26th straight single going back to June 14. He doesn't have an extra-base hit in (84) plate appearances.

"If he goes on this pace, he'll get 1,800 sometime this year," Riggleman said. "It's unbelievable what he's accomplished since he's been here and we just hope he keeps doing it."

Including his 1,278 hits in Japan, Suzuki needs 22 hits for a combined 3,000 in his career.

The Tigers solved Silva with RBI singles by Placido Polanco in the third inning and Ivan Rodriguez in the fourth, then three runs on four hits in the fifth when they broke a 2-2 tie.

Curtis Granderson started that inning with a triple before Carlos Guillen's RBI grounder made the score 3-2. The next three Tigers singled, including RBI hits by Matt Joyce and Gary Sheffield for a 5-2 score.

Silva, whose ERA jumped to the highest in the starting rotation at 5.85, was finished after that.

"I've got no complaints about the way the ball comes out of his hand," Riggleman said. "It just hasn't been happening. We'll keep running him out there and hope he turns it around. He's a big pat of this staff and we need him to go deep into ballgames."

Rookie shortstop Matt Holliman hit his first career homer in the sixth off M's reliever Mark Lowe, and Rodriguez pushed a bases-loaded single down the right-field line in the ninth off Roy Corcoran to score the Tigers' final two runs.

The Mariners scored twice in the ninth and left two more runners watching the final out of the game when Jeff Clement popped out to left, where Clete Thomas made a lunging catch.

The Tigers, who were the Mariners of the American League Central after they'd fallen 11 games out of first place on June 9, now are where the M's can only dream. Their eighth victory in 11 games pulled them within six games of the first-place White Sox.

The Mariners, meanwhile, are 18 games behind the first-place Angels in the AL West.